MONDAY
July 21, 2014 • $1.00
RACE AROUND CRYSTAL LAKE
Angie Sanabria
Tour de Crystal Lake featured 10 races, providing veteran and first-time riders alike a chance to compete / B1 NWHerald.com
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MCCD chipping at large to-do list Trail, walkway and restroom upgrades next By EMILY K. COLEMAN ecoleman@shawmedia.com
cause it’s fast.” Soap box cars rely on gravity and the angle of the downhill course to move. The All-American race splits racers into three divisions based on their level of experience. Jason Packard will compete this year in the Stock division, for 7 to 13 year olds. Rachel will compete in the Super Stock, which accepts children ages 9 to 18. The most advanced racer tries his or her luck in the Masters division for 10 through 18 year olds. But by the time Jason and Rachel line up Saturday, they will have already invested countless hours into their cars. Every second of excitement on the 989.4-foot track is earned by hours in the basement, adjusting spindles and making sure the wheel steers true. That was Rachel’s introduction to the program. As a toddler, she’d watch, fascinated, while her dad and stepbrother, Jacob Vester, worked on Jacob’s car. At age 3, Rachel pulled on her
WOODSTOCK – The walkways at three campsites, restrooms at a Wonder Lake conservation area and sections of the Prairie Trail are next on a lengthy to-do list to improve accessibility. Updated regulations created under the Americans with Disabilities Act added recreational facilities and improved outdoor spaces to its scope, requiring entities such as the McHenry County Conservation District to make sure visitors with disabilities can have the same outdoor experience as anyone else. The conservation district doesn’t have the funds to do everything on its to-do list, so it has to prioritize, Executive Director Elizabeth Kessler said. The two reports it has on the subject – one on sites and another on facilities – add up to 156 pages. The district has been chipping away at the list, first taking care of everything that could be handled inhouse or at no cost and then moving on to larger improvements. In prioritizing its projects, the district considers multiple factors, including how often is the space used, whether accessible alternatives exist, whether the improvement can be made as part of regular maintenance and if there’s funding for it, Kessler said. The Marengo Ridge Conservation Area is a popular site, she said. That’s why two of its campsites at Thomas Woods are set to have their walking paths improved this year. The district’s Board of Trustees approved putting the project – which
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Photos by Kyle Grillot – kgrillot@shawmedia.com
Jason Packard (left), 11, and Rachel Packard, 14, sit inside their boxcars July 11 in the driveway of their Woodstock home. The siblings will be competing in the National Soap Box Derby in Akron, Ohio.
Fast runs in the family Packard siblings prepare for All-American Soap Box Derby in Ohio
By SHAWN SHINNEMAN sshinneman@shawmedia.com WOODSTOCK – There’s something about the band playing its way down that hill. Every year, moments before race day starts on Saturday morning at the All-American Soap Box Derby, Jeff Packard stands with his family and watches and hears and feels the band, a local high school group, while it marches in. And for whatever reason, that’s the moment the nostalgia hits. That’s when 40-plus years of building and tinkering and racing flashes through the Ohio air. “Boy, does that bring back some memories,” said Packard, a soap box derby veteran from Woodstock. “And some butterflies to my stomach.” Packard’s kids will continue the family tradition this year in Akron, Ohio, at the national tournament for qualifying soap box derby racers from across the country – some, from around the world. Rachel Packard, 14, and Jason Packard, 11, will race in the Super Stock and
Rachel Packard places a helmet on her brother, Jason, on July 11 in the driveway of their Woodstock home. Stock divisions. Each are making return trips. Rachel will compete for the third time, this time having qualified through the Rally Race Program – a way drivers can accumulate points through competing in several tour-
naments. Jason is back for the second time after winning the local Chicago race in his division. “I like the racing,” said Jason, who will begin sixth grade at Northwood Middle School in the fall. “Be-
Scores dead in first major Israel-Hamas ground battle in Gaza U.N. chief: Israel’s incursion ‘atrocious’ By KARIN LAUB and TIA GOLDENBERG The Associated Press GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – The first major ground battle in two weeks of Israel-Hamas fighting exacted a steep price Sunday: It killed 65 Palestin-
ians and 13 Israeli soldiers and forced thousands of terrified Palestinian civilians to flee their neighborhood, reportedly used to launch rockets at Israel and now devastated by the fighting. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the offensive would continue “as long as necessary” to end attacks from Gaza on Israeli civilians. But Hamas seems defiant, international cease-fire efforts are stalled,
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and international criticism is becoming more vocal as the death toll among Palestinian civilians rises. U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon called Israel’s latest incursion “atrocious,” and said it must do far more to protect civilians. Several diplomats said the U.N. Security Council would hold an emergency session Sunday night at 8:30 a.m. at the request of council member Jordan on the situation in Gaza. In Israel, public opinion will strug-
gle to tolerate rising military losses in an open-ended campaign. Already, Sunday’s deaths marked the highest number of soldiers killed on a single day since Israel’s war in Lebanon in 2006. The ferocious battle in Gaza City’s Shijaiyah neighborhood came on the third day of Israel’s ground offensive, which had been preceded by a 10-day air campaign. In all, at least 432 Palestinians were killed and more than 3,000
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wounded in the past two weeks. The overall death toll on the Israeli side rose to 20, including 18 soldiers, along with dozens of wounded troops, during that period. On Sunday evening, Hamas spokesman Mushir al-Masri in Gaza claimed his group captured an Israeli soldier. An announcement on Gaza TV of the soldier’s capture set off celebration in the streets of Gaza City.
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McIlroy wins British Open 25-year-old Rory McIlroy becomes first start-to-finish winner at British Open since Tiger Woods in 2005 / B1
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